When Smith & Wesson released the CSX, I was incredibly interested. I rushed to see it at SHOT all those years ago, but a lot of my interest fell off almost immediately. It was a mini-1911 with a micro-compact magazine, which sounds great, but it was lacking. Does the CSX E-Series fix the mistakes of the original?
To answer that, we have to talk about what was wrong with the original CSX. First, the trigger kind of sucked. It was heavy for a single-action design, but the real problem was the false reset. I don’t ride the trigger, but a false reset can be annoying.
The gun also lacked the ability to use optics, which dated the gun immediately. Magazines would also fail to insert on a closed slide when fully loaded, and the polymer grip panels would detach easily. None of these were major problems — this wasn’t a Remington R51 — but they made it easy to choose the Shield Plus over the CSX.
The CSX E-Series launched earlier this year, promising to fix the issues CSX owners had and introduce an entirely new model with a 3.6-inch barrel. I originally liked the CSX because it did something different—in a world of polymer-framed, striker-fired pistols, it dared to have a metal frame and be hammer-fired.
The CSX: It’s Like a 1911, But Not
The gun is very 1911-like, but it’s not a shrunken 1911. The internals are redesigned, making it a bit like a SIG P238/P938. It looks and largely feels like a 1911, but it’s not. Notably, things like a grip safety are gone (and good riddance).
The magazine is a stack-and-a-half, which gives you 12 rounds in a flush-fitting magazine with a grip width of about an inch. The CSX comes with 12, 15, and 17-round magazines. We aren’t stuck with single-stack magazines.
The new E-Series delivers an optics-ready platform with an RMSc footprint. You do have to remove the rear sight to attach the optic, which is a minor annoyance, but not a huge deal.
I prefer the 3.6-inch model, and that’s what we are shooting today.
The CSX: Surprisingly Modular
You pop open that blue and white cardboard box, and you’re greeted with a gun, three magazines, and numerous parts and pieces to adapt the gun to fit you. I was pleasantly surprised by the gun’s modularity, especially your ability to change the grip’s dimensions.
As you’d expect, the 15 and 17-round magazines protrude a fair bit from the gun. If you want to increase the grip length, you can use one of two methods. First, the gun comes with a series of spacers that attach to your magazine and fill those gaps.
This allows you to use all three magazines and extend the grip depending on the magazine. That’s fine, but if you’re like me, you’ll often find your pinky pinning the magazine in by the extension. S&W also included a backstrap and grip adapter that lengthens the grip in its entirety.
With this extension installed, we lose the ability to use the 12-round magazine, but we get a longer grip that accommodates the 15 and 17-round magazines. I prefer the longer magazines and grips for my hands, so I swapped the backstrap and kept the longer grip.
Shooting The CSX
The CSX E-Series and I hit the range and hit it hard. Let’s start by talking about ergonomics. S&W went out of their way to ensure the CSX series is an ergonomic gun. The safety and slide release are both ambidextrous.
The magazine release can be reversed for lefties as well. The grip is metal with polymer inserts that feature the aggressive M&P-style texture. It’s quite suitable and provides an excellent grip. The slide moves with ease, making it a solid choice for shooters who might have weaker hands.
The controls are small, allowing them to be somewhat snag-free and out of the way, but you can click the safety on and off easily and drop or lock the slide without difficulty. The slide lock is fantastic, and my thumbs don’t pin it down.
Both are 1911-like, and the ergonomics are fantastic overall. The magazine release is easy to hit, and the longer grip extension fills my hand nicely. We get the 1911-like beavertail, which does allow for a high grip, but it doesn’t stop slide bite.
That’s my biggest complaint with this gun: it carves my hands up. This isn’t going to be an issue for normal people, but my glove size is 2XL, and lots of small guns do this to me. I can avoid slide bite by pushing my thumb down, but that compromises my grip.
Some photos show that I compromised my grip because I “sissied out” several hundred rounds in, and it hurt.
Shooting Straight
What kind of accuracy can we expect from the CSX E-Series? With a red dot, quite a bit. I like being able to hit an IPSC-sized steel target at 50 yards with my concealed carry firearm. I can do that without much challenge with the CSX E-Series and the CAT0 red dot.
Hitting a reduced-size IPSC target wasn’t as easy, but I could do so with some regularity. Careful, slow shots were an absolute must to hit the 33% sized reduced IPSC target. At 25 yards, I was making rapid headshots from the low ready, and at 15 yards, I was making tiny groups in the brain housing group.
S&W fixed the trigger and made it much better. It’s lighter, smoother, and doesn’t have a false reset. I have no complaints. It’s quite nice, and the short pull makes shooting fast, fun, and easy.
Going Fast
Speaking of fast, the CSX E-Series handles well when shot rapidly. Shooting fast, long strings of fire isn’t a major challenge. The grip texture panels are nice and aggressive, which allow for a slip-free grip in the humid Florida spring.
I wish the grip texture were absolutely everywhere on the gun, but ultimately, it’s fine as is. When shooting, the gun doesn’t try to fight its way out of your hand. The longer 3.6-inch model avoids being snappy and feels quite smooth.
The dot drifts out of the optic but settles back on the target quickly and efficiently. It was so fast that I finally cracked the 2-second mark on a Bill Drill. I fired several and somehow scored one 1.98-second Bill Drill.
That’s my fastest ever, and I couldn’t repeat it again, to my great frustration. But I’ll take it as a baby step toward my goal of consistent on-demand performance. Even if I couldn’t repeat that performance, it proves the gun runs quickly and accurately.
Sub-half-second double taps are no problem, neither are sub-1.5-second Failure To Stop drills. The gun’s primed to succeed and go fast.
The Chief Special X
I had zero reliability issues; even the slide cutting into my hand didn’t create any malfunctions. The gun ate through a lot of Monarch steel case without complaint.
Overall, the CSX E-Series 3.6-inch impressed me. It’s the gun I wanted it to be all those years ago when it first premiered. S&W has fixed my complaints and delivered something that stands out in a sea of striker-fired, micro-compact, polymer-framed guns.
